Situation: Computer output printing costs are high (printers, paper and toner), especially with employees having their own printers in their offices. Obesity rates are high and sitting at one's desk does not help one get exercise. We have become extremely dependent on electronic communication.

Cost cutting idea: Phase out individual printers and replace with one printer per floor, or one per work area. This would...
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Room temperatures should be comfortable for people to work in adequate clothing that does not restrict movement. During the Summer time room temperatures are set to 72F, in the Winter time temperature is set to 80 degrees. Both are extreme temperatures and not comfortable at all. We are constantly calling maintenance, they come in tape the ducts, make some adjustments and a few days later we are back to the starting point....
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Since each Agency usually has more than one employee attending events such as training, conferences, and meetings I suggest putting two employees of the same gender to a hotel room instead of one and cutting down on lodging expenses.

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Allow rollover of the unspent budget from one year to the next so that the money is spent effectively. Currently, if money is left unspent in one year it is not added to the next year's budget. This causes imprudent year-end spending and procurement of unnecessary equipments, reagents etc. Government can save enormous amount of money if the left over money from one year is allowed to be added to following year's budget....
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My experience with my mother's interaction with doctors while on Medicare is that she would go in, talk to the doctor briefly, and then get labs prescribed, with many tests. Then, she would return two weeks later to go over the test results. The same things happens with my private insurance doctor -- I get a physical, he prescribes labs, and then I get the results, AFTER the physical. If I need to discuss the results,...
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The cost of paying travel agencies for service as well as utilizing contract vendors (airlines, rental cars, etc.) far exceeds what employees can obtain via the internet. No refund tickets are less expensive than contract airlines even if you have to pay the change fee.

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CMS builds unique systems in response to similar often overlapping legislation enacted by Congress. This creates an inefficient use of taxpayer money and causes confusion and frustration for our providers, vendors, and beneficiaries. Contracts are awarded and millions of dollars are spent developing these systems. I think we could save money if Congress looked at the Programs that were previously enacted and built...
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Eliminating in-person NIH grant peer review and replacing thiswith online reviews will save millions annually. Also it will reduce time spent traveling by hundreds of scientist reviewers and NIH staff. It will reduce funds spent on hotels, travel, meeting space and per diem for all in person study section reviews. Research conducted by Alexander Pentland at MIT suggests project reviewers who watch in person presentations...
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Can we have designated temperature zones at work places: These are real distractors at work. Ever noticed the space heaters at office.. and resulting double drain on power -one to run the AC and the other to keep the personal heater running.

With the cold air from the air conditioning running full blast, comes the misery for a few with genuine body temperature regulation issues. Some may have hypothyroidism. They usually...
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Waste incineration can be done at the massive federal complexes like already done at hospitals.

Also being done in Virginia. Set up furnaces to incinerate the office waste including print and then use steam turbines to generate electricity. Incinerate papers un-shredded (!) as well as those daily litter generated at our workplaces, cafeterias and yard care.

For now they end up in landfills someplace far away, ‘shredded’...
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We purchase so much furniture for offices and conference rooms. There are purchases of office chairs that cost over 400 dollars. In addition of furniture purchases for employees, there is a high turnover of employees to newer positions and the chairs are left behind or put in hallways. We dont have 400 dollar chairs at home, so why at work. We should not be allowed to use corporate businesses (such as staples or office...
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I work in a location with floor-to-ceiling windows. If half of the ceiling light fixtures were removed, or if we could turn off half of the lights, this would save energy. I don't think this would not cause a reading problem, since we receive a large amount of natural light.

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I know many people, including in my own family, that receive government assistance for food, daycare, WIC, etc. It amazes me how they can qualify for these benefits and still walk around with an iphone/blackberry, flat screen tvs, cable, manicures etc. If you can afford the luxury items, you can afford to pay for your own groceries or rent. I don't have any of these items and I make a good living.

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Just as the government expanded,it can also contract.I live and work in a metro area where there are 5 Social Security field offices. I'm sure that by closing one or more in each metro area that the agency can combine resources and employees into less offices and save money.

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There has been a nation wide shortage of Acetylsistene in 4ml bottles. Typically patients that need this for respiratory need use 2-3 milileters at a time between 2- 4 times a day.During this shortage the way it has been dispensed is in 30 mililiter bottles. The expiration date is 72 hours after opening the bottle. In my humble opinion it would be of more benefit to have pharmacy draw these up in 3 mililiter syringes...
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